An overview of selected family and personal names that belong or are related to the Skowronek banking family.

"One cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvellous structure of reality." - Albert Einstein.

These families are related to one another via non-morganatic marriages in many different ways. all its members can be considered close to relatively-close cousins, since the degrees of separation between their members is also relatively small. Even in the case of families in which some branches might get separated by three or more degrees, practically in all cases it is possible to find additional cross-marriages that bring the families that at one point tend to get increasingly separated together again.

The blood links of some of these families extend back in several cases to a thousand years ago, showing how despite even in the face of endless persecution the caste of Jewish bankers, thinkers and religious leaders have survived and prospered to a point that seemed and still seems unimaginable to many outsiders.

Adler - This family was connected for more than a century to the chief rabbinate of England, it originated in Frankfurt and is connected to the Schoenbergs in Alzey and Warsaw, as well to other families of the Gesinde.

Auerbach - Auerbach is a name related to the Skowronek, Blat and Schoenberg families; it originates back in the XV century.

Bacharach - Bacharach is a well-known family name that connects several other families like Rothschild, Schoenberg and Oppenheim.

Bamberger - Ludwig Bamberger was the founder of the Deutsche Bank and Elizabeth Schoenberg was his wife.

Blat - Meaning 'leaf' in German, Blat is a relatively common family name; however, those Blats that were related to the Gesinde show relatively evident familiar relations to well-established family names.

Brody - A family name whose meaning usually gets confused; many believe it derives from Broder, Bruder or Brother, but it really means from Brody, indicating that the family comes from the similarly-named town.

Buchsbaum - Buchsbaum is a fairly old surname within the extended family, with recurrent links between the XV and XX centuries.

Danziger - This is the family of Rebbe Yitzkhak Menakhem Danziger, founder of the Hasidic dynasty of Aleksander.

De Menezes - This is a name that binds together the Schoenberg and Fürst family names in Portugal, back in the XIV century.

Klepfisz - Klepfisz is one of those surnames that are linked to several rabbinical, banking and industrial families, particularly during the XIX and XX centuries in Warsaw; it is also the surname of a family of rabbinical scholars, bund leaders, war heroes and even relatives of the Gomulka family from which the leader of the early years of communist Poland emerged.

Kronenberg - A family of bankers, industrialists and railway owners from Warsaw.

Lerner - This is an interesting family name that links by means of intermarriage in the XIX several important families of Warsaw and Kraków.

Lichtenstein - Rabbi Yitzkhak Lichtenstein from Hungary was a believer in Jesus; the surname Lichtenstein is one of several Scholars as well.

Luria - From the Luria family emerged the founder of the modern Kabbalah and many prominent writers, thinkers and scientists.

Meisels - A well known dynasty of rabbis and leaders, including staunch supporters of Polish independence during the XIX century.

Richthofen - The family of the Red Baron was married to some families of the Gesinde, and its relationships to our families of bankers existed thorough other blood and marriage links within the European aristocracy, with common ancestors as well.

Reichert - The Reichert family appears in HessenGermany, and in Warsaw and Lodz, in Poland; they were industrialists and real-estate investors.

Rosochocki - The surname Rosochocki barely appears in the historical records of the family; nevertheless, it has been essential to prove some significant facts.

Rotenberg - Some of the strangest stories of our family are linked to the surname Rotenberg.

Rothschild - The most famous banking name, associated with all sort of bizarre conspiracy theories, is also associated by ancestry to other banking households, including our own.

Vanderbilt - There are at least two links between the Schoenberg and Vanderbilt families; one is direct, thorough the marriage of Oliver Belmont and Alva Erskine Smith - Vanderbilt, and the other thorough the family of Benny Goodman.

Warburg - A family of German - Jewish bankers that also shines in arts and sciences.

Wertheim - A household name; among the families of the Gesinde, Wertheim was one of the most successful and prolific.

Indeed, there are many more first names and family names to consider; as the title says, this is just an overview. It is important also to consider that several family names were titles converted to surnames or vice-versa, and that some of those were used thorough history in either form, meaning that such families might appear listed as bearing titles of different nations or not. Since some branches of certain families received such titles in some countries (example, Rothschild, mentioned also as de Rothschild or von Rothschild, or von Hanau and Hanau, depending on the family branch) while others changed or used simpler variants for the sake of simplicity (von Schoenberg or de Schoenenberg, used as Schoenberg) we opted to mention them without the title particles like von, van, de, di, etc.